westerners wearing arabian clothes

Dress codes differ from one company to another, so the only one who can answer your question about wearing trousers and T shirt is someone from your company, and generally its perfectly fine to wear a national dress, but I've heard about some companies that restrict wearing national dresses to locals only.

hope that helps

The western-euro guys at my job wear slacks, button button-up shirts and ties--no suits.

I only saw non-arabs in thobes once or twice and I thought they looked stupid (no offense to anybody--just my personal taste)

Business etiquette here dictates that if you are a westerner non Arab in management or sales (customer facing then wear a tie) then you wear a suit. If you are just in the office then it would be as the company dress code. Wearing local dress is fine but you may get some looks and be the odd one out

thank you all, I just thought that wearing local clothes is better because locals know better what to wear in local conditions:) For me, the best would be normal casual clothes.

Eggoide, Stick to the your normal 'casual attire.'   If you are required to meet with a customer, then something a bit more formal may be required.  Wearing  the thobe may not be in your best interest!  You will get a feel for what is the 'norm' when you get to the office.

You can always enjoy wearing the local clothing on weekends.

some westerns can get away with dressing local like. people will guess they are from palestine or syria or something. but not thats its a crime or anything, some saudi's go as far as saying it is not allowed by law for non arabs to dress like us. but there is no such law that states that. I for one know this.

I am non arab, and when I look at my self five years ago, 99% of my dress code was arabic. today its 50%

it depends on your enviroment.

Salman

oh, and welcome to Saudi Arabia eggoide.

I have two thobes that I wear around pretty frequently. Salman is right, I generally get mistaken for Syrian or Lebanese.

I have not had any negative reaction to wearing the thobe, some people assume you speak Arabic though, so be ready for that.

I don't know what you should wear at work, but wearing a thobe is perfectly fine when you are off...just be ready to engage in lots of conversation about it, as it will draw some interest. If you look uncomfortable wearing it, then people will look at you funny, but if you wear it with a bit of confidence, you should be fine...

TE

My recommendation is to choose the dress code prevalent in your own workspae.

I think its quite OK to wear the thob during non working times and on weekends. I do too, sometimes. Its quite comfy.